Close Call

Whoa, that was close! After Trace and Sarah got fired, I fully expected to be the next one to go. Plus, Jeff scheduled my review for Friday afternoon and everyone knows people always get fired on Fridays. It didn't help that the cameras followed me around for the entire day (which they never do because my job rarely sees me do anything too sensational), to capture the last television footage of Jett Pink ever to be seen. They obviously knew something was up. When review time finally arrived, I was pretty much resigned to the fact that I'd be hitting the road for good. So Jeff brought me in and gave me the run down of why I was on the chopping block: I don't make him any money (basically true), I'm always late (pretty much true, see next paragraph), and my favorite -- I waited too long to prove to him that I had a brain. Seriously. I don't remember hiding the fact that I'm capable of a wide range a business tasks beyond grocery shopping and shining shoes, but apparently I did. Fair enough. The important part of the story is that I didn't get fired and still totally work there. 

The biggest strike against me was that I was often late. Everyone knows that Jeff doesn't tolerate tardiness, and I was well aware of that fact. But for a three week period I was often five to ten minutes late and my reason for being so was very specific: Caltrans (the California Department of Transportation). Never before has a government agency made me want to stop paying taxes more than Caltrans. They have been building a monorail or some other ridiculous monstrosity of public transportation that no one cares about directly through West LA for two years now. During this time they periodically, and without warning, close the only road into West Hollywood for days at a time. This leaves about a million cars with no option but to tear around through the ghetto side streets, trying to make any kind of northward progress. Crazy gridlock quickly ensues, people lose their jobs, lives are ruined, etc. I really wish the city of Los Angeles would stop trying to push public transportation on us and just make the roads wider and sync the traffic lights. A light rail system, really? I almost got fired so a bunch of hipsters could have an easy way to get downtown to go to their stupid art walks? 

All right, I'm down off my soapbox. Trace also got fired in dramatic form in this episode. He was always really cool to me, but Jeff's the boss and you have to keep the boss happy!